2. PROOF FROM SCRIPTURE

The first question which we need to ask ourselves then,
is, Do we find this doctrine taught in the Scriptures? Let us turn to Paul's
letter to the Ephesians.
There we read: "He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we
should be holy and without blemish before Him in love; having foreordained us
unto adoption as sons through Jesus Christ unto Himself, according to the good
pleasure of His will," 1:4, 5. In Romans 8:29, 30 we read of that golden chain of redemption which stretches from
the eternity that is past to the eternity that is to come,—"For whom He
foreknew, He also foreordained to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He
might be the first-born among many brethren; and whom He foreordained, them He
also called: and whom He called, them He also justified: and whom He justified,
them He also glorified." Foreknown, foreordained, called, justified, glorified,
with always the same people included in each group; and where one of these
factors is present, all the others are in principle present with it.

Paul has cast the verse in the past tense because with
God the purpose is in principle executed when formed, so certain is it of
fulfillment. "These five golden links," says Dr. Warfield, "are welded together
in one unbreakable chain, so that all who are set upon in God's gracious
distinguishing view are carried on by His grace, step by step, up to the great
consummation of that glorification which realizes the promised conformity to the
image of God's own Son. It is 'election,' you see, that does all this; for 'whom
He foreknew, . . . . . them He also glorified'."4141 Pamphlet, Election, p. 10.

The Scriptures represent election as occurring in past
time, irrespective of personal merit, and altogether
sovereign,—"The children being not yet born, neither having
done anything good or bad, that the purpose of God according to election might
stand, not of works, but of Him that calleth, it
was said to her, The elder shall serve the younger. Even as it is written, Jacob
I loved, but Esau I hated," Romans 9:11,
12. Now if the doctrine of election is not true, we
may safely challenge any man to tell us what the apostle means by such language.
"We are pointed illustratively to the sovereign acceptance of Isaac and
rejection of Ishmael, and to the choice of Jacob and not of Esau before their
birth and therefore before either had done good or bad; we are explicitly told
that in the matter of salvation it is not of him that wills, or of him that
runs, but of God that shows mercy, and that He has mercy on whom He will, and
whom He will He hardens; we are pointedly directed to behold in God the potter
who makes the vessels which proceed from His hand each for an end of His
appointment, that He may work out His will upon them. It is safe to say that
language cannot be chosen better adapted to teach Predestination at its
height."4242 Warfield, Biblical Doctrines, p. 50.

Even if we were without any other inspired utterances
than those quoted from Paul, so clear and unambiguous are those that we should
be constrained to admit that the doctrine of Election finds a place in
Scripture. By looking at the Scripture references in the Confession of Faith, we
find that it is abundantly sustained in the Bible. If we admit the inspiration
of the Bible; if we admit that the writings of the prophets and apostles were
breathed by the Spirit of God, and are thus infallible, then what we find there
will be sufficient; and thus on the irrefutable testimony of the Scriptures we
must acknowledge Election, or Predestination, to be an established truth, and
one which we must receive if we are to possess the whole counsel of God. Every
Christian must believe in some kind of election; for while the Scriptures leave
unexplained many things about the doctrine of Election, they make very plain the
FACT that there has been an election.

Christ explicitly declared to His disciples, "Ye did not
choose me, but I chose you, and appointed you, that ye should go and bear
fruit," John 15:16, by
which He made God's choice primary and man's choice only secondary and a result
of the former. The Arminian, however, in making salvation depend upon man's
choice to use or abuse proffered grace reverses this order and makes man's
choice the primary and decisive one. There is no place in the Scriptures for an
election which is carefully adjusted to the foreseen actions of the creature.
The divine will is never made dependent on the creaturely will for its
determinations.

Again the sovereignty of this choice is clearly taught
when Paul declares that God commended His love toward us in that while we were yet sinners Christ
died for us (Romans 5:8),
and that Christ died for the ungodly (Romans 5:6). Here we see that His love
was not extended toward us because we were good, but in spite of the fact that
we were bad. It is God who chooses the person and causes him to approach unto
Him (Psalm 65:4).
Arminianism takes this choice out of the hands of God and places it in the hands
of man. Any system which substitutes a man-made election falls below the
Scripture teaching on this subject.

In the darkest days of Israel's apostasy, as in every
other age, it was this principle of election which made a difference between
mankind and kept a remnant secure. "Yet will I leave me seven thousand in
Israel, all the knees which have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth which hath
not kissed him," 1 Kings 19:18. These seven thousand did not stand by their own strength; it is
expressly said that God reserved them to Himself, that they might be a
remnant.

It is for the sake of the elect that God governs the
course of all history (Mark 13:20). They are "the salt of the earth," and "the light of the world;"
and so far at least in the world's history they are the few through whom the
many are blessed,—God blessed the household of Potiphar for Joseph's
sake; and ten righteous people would have saved the city of Sodom. Their
election, of course, includes the opportunity of hearing the gospel and
receiving the gifts of grace, for without these means the great end of election
would not be attained. They are, in fact, elected to all that is included in the
idea of eternal life.

Apart from this election of individuals to life, there
has been what we may call a national election, or a divine predestination of
nations and communities to a knowledge of true religion and to the external
privileges of the Gospel. God undoubtedly does choose some nations to receive
much greater spiritual and temporal blessings than others. This form of election
has been well illustrated in the Jewish nation, in certain European nations and
communities, and in America. The contrast is very striking when we compare these
with other nations such as China, Japan, India, etc.

Throughout the Old Testament it is repeatedly stated that
the Jews were a chosen people. "You only have I known of all the families of the
earth," Amos 3:2. "He hath
not dealt so with any (other) nation; And as for His ordinances, they have not
known them," Psalm 147:20.
"For thou art a holy people unto Jehovah thy God: Jehovah thy God hath chosen
thee to be a people for His own possession, above all the peoples that are upon
the face of the earth," Deuteronomy 7:6. It is made equally plain that God found no merit or dignity in
the Jews themselves which moved Him to choose them above others. "Jehovah did
not set His love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than
any other people; for ye were the fewest of all peoples: but because Jehovah
loveth you, and because He would keep the oath which He swore unto your fathers,
hath Jehovah brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the
house of bondage from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt." Deuteronomy 7:7, 8. And again, "Only
Jehovah had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and He chose their seed after
them, even above all peoples," Deuteronomy
10:15. Here it is carefully explained, that Israel
was honored with the divine choice in contrast with the treatment accorded all
the other peoples of the earth, that the choice rested solely on the unmerited
love of God, and that It had no foundation in Israel itself.

When Paul was forbidden by the Holy Spirit to preach the
Gospel in the province of Asia, and was given the vision of a man in Europe
calling across the waters, "Come over into Macedonia, and help us," one section
of the world was sovereignly excluded from, and another section was sovereignly
given, the privileges of the Gospel. Had the divinely directed call been rather
from the shores of India, Europe and America might today have been less
civilized than the natives of Tibet. It was the sovereign choice of God which
brought the Gospel to the people of Europe and later to America, while the
people of the east, and north, and south were left in darkness. We can assign no
reason, for instance, why it should have been Abraham's seed, and not the
Egyptians or the Assyrians, who were chosen; or why Great Britain and America,
which at the time of Christ's appearance on earth were in a state of such
complete ignorance, should today possess so largely for themselves, and be
disseminating so widely to others, these most important spiritual privileges.
The diversities in regard to religious privileges in the different nations is to
be ascribed to nothing else than the good pleasure of God.

A third form of election taught in Scripture is that of
individuals to the external means of grace, such as hearing and reading the
Gospel, association with the people of God, and sharing the benefits of the
civilization which has arisen where the Gospel has gone. No one ever had the
chance to say at what particular time in the world's history, or in what
country, he would be born, whether or not he would be a member of the white
race, or of some other. One child is born with health, wealth, and honor, in a
favored land, in a Christian home, and grows up with all the blessings which
attend the full light of the Gospel. Another is born in poverty and dishonor, of
sinful and dissipated parents, and destitute of Christian influences. All of
these things are sovereignly decided for them. Surely no one would insist that
the favored child has any personal merit which could be the ground for this
difference. Furthermore, was it not of God's own choosing that He created us
human beings, in His own image, when He might have created us cattle or horses
or dogs? Or who would allow the dumb brutes to revile God for their condition in
life as though the distinction was unjust? All of these things are due to God's
overruling providence, and not to human choice. "Arminians have labored to
reconcile all this, as a matter of fact, with their defective and erroneous
views of the Divine sovereignty, and with their unscriptural doctrines of
universal grace and universal redemption; but they have not usually been
satisfied themselves with their own attempts at explanation, and have commonly
at last admitted, that there were mysteries in this matter which could not be
explained, and which must just be resolved into the sovereignty of God and the
unsearchableness of His counsels."4343 Cunningham, Historical Theology, II, p. 398.

We may perhaps mention a fourth kind of election, that of
individuals to certain vocations,—the gifts of special talents which fit
one to be a statesman, another to be a doctor, or lawyer, or farmer, or
musician, or artisan, gifts of personal beauty, intelligence, disposition, etc.
These four kinds of election are in principle the same. Arminians escape no real
difficulty in admitting the second, third, and fourth, while denying the first.
In each instance God gives to some what He withholds from others. Conditions in
the world at large and our own experiences in every day life show us that the
blessings bestowed are sovereign and unconditional, irrespective of any previous
merit or action on the part of those so chosen. If we are highly favored, we can
only be thankful for His blessings; if not highly favored, we have no grounds
for complaint. Why precisely this or that one is placed in circumstances which
lead to saving faith, while others are not so placed, is indeed, a mystery. We
cannot explain the workings of Providence; but we do know that the Judge of all
the earth shall do right, and that when we attain to perfect knowledge we shall
see that He has sufficient reasons for all His acts.

Furthermore, it may be said that in general the outward
conditions with which the individual is surrounded do determine his
destiny,—at least to this extent, that those from whom the Gospel is withheld have no
chance for salvation. Cunningham has stated this very well in the following
paragraph:—"There is an invariable connection established in Gods government
of the world, between the enjoyment of outward privileges, or the means of
grace, on the one hand, and faith and salvation on the other; in this sense, and
to this extent, that the negation of the first implies the negation of the
second. We are warranted by the whole tenor of Scripture, in maintaining that
where God, in His sovereignty, withholds from men the enjoyment of the means of
grace,—an opportunity of becoming acquainted with the only way of salvation,—He
at the same time, and by the same means, or ordination, withholds from them
the opportunity and power of believing and being saved." 4444 Historical Theology, II, p. 467.

Calvinists maintain that God deals not only with mankind
in the mass but with the individuals who are actually saved, that He has elected
particular persons to eternal life and to all the means necessary for attaining
that life. They admit that some of the passages in which election is mentioned
teach only an election of nations, or an election to outward privileges, but
they maintain that many other passages teach exclusively and only an election of
individuals to eternal life.

There are some, of course, who deny that there has been
any such thing as an election at all. They start at the very word as though it
were a spectre just come from the shades and never seen before. And yet, in the
New Testament alone, the words eklektos, ekloga, and eklego, elect, election, choose, are found some forty-seven
or forty-eight times (see Young's Analytical Concordance for complete lists).
Others accept the word but attempt to explain away the thing. They profess to
believe in a "conditional election," based, as they suppose, upon foreseen faith
and evangelical obedience in its objects. This, of course, destroys election in
any intelligible sense of the term, and reduces it to a mere recognition or
prophecy that at some future time certain persons will be possessed of those
qualities. If based on faith and evangelical obedience, then, as it has been
cynically phrased, God is careful to elect only those whom He foresees will
elect themselves. In the Arminian system election is reduced to a mere word or
name, the use of which only tends to involve the subject in greater obscurity
and confusion. A mere recognition that those qualities will be present at some
future time is, of course, an election falsely so-called, or simply no election
at all. And some Arminians, consistently carrying out their own doctrine that
the person may or may not accept, and that if he does accept he may fall away
again, identify the time of this decree of election with the death of the
believer, as if only then his salvation became certain.

Election extends not only to men but also and equally to
the angels since they also are a part of God's creation and are under His
government. Some of these are holy and happy, others are sinful and miserable.
The same reasons which lead us to believe in a predestination of men also lead
us to believe in a predestination of angels. The Scriptures confirm this view by
references to "elect angels," 1 Timothy 5:21, and "holy angels,"
Mark 8:38, which are contrasted with
wicked angels or demons. We read that God "spared not angels when they sinned,
but cast them down to hell, and committed them to pits of darkness to be
reserved unto judgment," 2 Peter 2:4; of the "eternal fire which is prepared for the Devil and his
angels," Matthew 25:41; of
"angels that kept not their own principality, but left their former habitation,
He hath kept in everlasting bonds under darkness unto the Judgment of the great
day," Jude 6; and of
"Michael and his angels going forth to war with the dragon; and the dragon
warred and his angels," Revelation 12:7. A study of these passages shows us
that, as Dabney says, "there
are two kinds of spirits of that order; holy and sinful angels, servants of
Christ and servants of Satan; that they were created in an estate of holiness
and happiness, and abode in the region called Heaven (God's holiness and
goodness are sufficient proof that He would never have created them otherwise);
that the evil angels voluntarily forfeited their estate by sinning, and were
excluded forever from heaven and holiness; that those who maintained their
estate were elected thereto by God, and that their estate of holiness and
blessedness is now forever assured." 4545 Theology, p. 230.

Paul makes no attempt to explain how God can be just in
showing mercy to whom He will and in passing by whom He will. In answer to the
objector's question, "Why doth He still find fault?" (with those to whom He has
not extended saving mercy), he (Paul) simply resolves the whole thing into the
sovereignty of God, by replying, "Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest
against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou
made me thus? Or hath not the potter a right over the clay, from the same lump
to make one part a vessel unto honor, and another unto dishonor?" Romans 9:19-21.
(And let it be noticed
here that Paul says that it is not from different kinds of clay, but "from the
same lump," that God, as the potter, makes one vessel unto honor and another
unto dishonor.) Paul does not drag God from His throne and set Him before our
human reason to be questioned and examined. These secret counsels of His, which
even the angels adore with trembling and desire to look into, are left
unexplained, except that they are said to be according to His own good pleasure.
And after Paul has stated this, he puts forth his hand, as it were, to forbid us
from going any further. Had the Arminian assumption been true, namely, that all
men are given sufficient grace and that each one is rewarded or punished
according to his own use or abuse of this grace, there would have been no
difficulty for which to account.

FURTHER SCRIPTURE PROOF

2 Thessalonians 2:13: God
chose you from the beginning unto salvation in sanctification of the Spirit and
belief of the truth.

Matthew 24:24: There shall
arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders;
so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect.

Matthew 24:31: And they (the
angels) shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of
heaven to the other.

Mark 13:20: For the elect's
sake, whom He chose, He shortened those days (at the destruction of
Jerusalem).